Opportunity's Still Going

It's been more than ten years since Opportunity landed on Mars, and the rover's still going at it, still sending back useful data, still trundling along at the incredibly rapid pace of a couple inches a second...at maximum speed.  Hey, over ten years, that adds up to, well, not that much.  A bit over 25 miles, which does surpass the record for most distance traveled on an off-world surface.

After so long on Mars, it's only natural that Opportunity has developed a few problems.  Frankly, it's amazing that none of those problems have stopped it, but they haven't.  In the past couple of months, the rover's been having computer trouble.  It's needed rebooting a dozen times, and the time has come for a drastic solution.  A complete memory wipe.  That will get rid of the glitches slowing Opportunity down, and allow it to get back to the mission.  According to NASA, this is a low-risk procedure, and Opportunity should be just fine.  It'll probably run better than it has in years.  So, hopefully nothing to worry about for the tough little rover.